Yay! Welcome to the blogging world! We have another blog themed topic here, but it´s different from your request: There we talk about blogs already started, which are trying to engage people, and you are asking how to start a blog. So, I guess I´ll keep both topics running.

Most of designer´s blogs are based on blogspot, including mine, but some also use WordPress. In my opinion, blogspot is fine for designing blog needs, and it´s better to customize. Wordpress, however, has other features that can be better used on other kinds of blogs - you can make it looking more like a site than a blog. The fact that you can only fully customize WP if you are a paid user is probably the reason people have to keep designing blogs on blogspot.

I am interested in this thread. I have not done a blog, and my scrapbooking might be the one reason I would consider starting a blog. I am active on some forums where I am comfortable to post my layouts (in accordance with each site's rules - usually by taking part in challenges) I have albums of my scrapbooking on my personal facebook page at a privacy setting that only my facebook friends can see. But apart from this I do not have a record of my digital scrapbooking journey in any one place (layouts are well filed and backed up by the month I made them) I am a scrapbook artist as opposed to designer (but have tried my hand at designing once and may do again) A blog seems to be almost expected in these digi-scrapping communities - however I read many blogs that share a lot of personal information and as scrapbooking is very personal I am a bit wary of privacy issues (for me and those I love). So yes, in considering where I want to go with this, I am interested in the 'how to' of having a blog as well as the privacy issues of what should and shouldn't be on a blog.

I think blogger is a popular choice because it's quick and easy to set up. WordPress is more customizable. If you're serious about building a great blog, I would probably use WordPress, but if you're just looking for a quick and simple place to post things Blogger is probably a good option.

I second what Marisa says. I've been blogging in blogger for almost three years, it's very easy, I've always considered switching to Wordpress but just haven't invested the time in doing so. When I started blogging I really wasn't sure what I was going to do with it, but now I think I've finally found a direction. I did have some photo / privacy issues arise with my blog, so I no longer post photos of my kids faces on my blog. I also, just learned this week that you can password protect certain posts you don't want public in wordpress, which, is very neat, so I myself might be making the switch to wordpress!

I know this is an old thread, but if anyone new wanders over to get info on which blog site to use, PLEASE go with Wordpress over Blogger! I am miserable on blog trains filling out captcha after captcha, having them not go through, having it erase my comment, starting over again... I want to just throw up my hands and not leave comments on those pages but I do feel it's important to thank designers for their generosity. It's always on Blogger/Blogspot blogs that I have to do through this absurdity.

When I've asked people why they have the horrible captcha security set up for commenters, they've told me it's because they get gross spam comments and need to filter them out. I have been using Wordpress since 2007, and they have a TERRIFIC spam filter. I've had to delete maybe two inappropriate comments over the past several years. I don't understand why Blogger can't just do the same thing for their users, but apparently they don't. So for the sake of all our carpal tunnels (which will break under the strain of so many captchas) please use Wordpress!

Or, alternately, disable the captcha on your Blogger blog and either hold comments for approval or just go through and deal with the spam comments on a case by case basis.

wow, I had a spam on blogger only once, which was caught by blogger as spam, and I have my blog there since 2008. The new blog in English didn´t have a spam till now, and it started in the beginning of the year. On my Wordpress, the anti-spam counts 507 spams. Sometimes it counts a real comment as spam, and once or twice it didn´t identified a spam.

Here in Brazil there is a strong movement from bloggers at blogspot to disable the captcha, it´s almost a rule "yes captcha, no comments". I do comment in blogs with captcha, but only on blog trains, but I really prefer the ones without it, and, sometimes, I don´t realise it has a captcha and close the tab before putting it, so the comment is lost. I really think people should just disabe word verification and give it a try, maybe adding that comments on the posts older than 15 days and containing links need to be aprooved by the blog owner (yes, there are these options).

@Violet Thank you so very much! I am so new to blogging that I didn't realize this was happening...I hate captcha but didn't realize I had to set the preference so people would not get it. I wanted to make it easy for everyone to get my BT submissions...even paid for the least expensive Mediafire so people would get a direct download vice having all those ads. And I cannot tell you how many times my ESET Security has blocked me from some downloads because of security issues! It only costs me $18 a year and well worth it so that downloaders will not have ads. This is one more thing to check off for ease of use. I also added the one click comments so that if a person does not have time or want to type in a comment it is easy for them.

It was hard enough to figure out Blogger but maybe I will go to Wordpress eventually.

I chose to take off the word verification and add the approval always. Might be a little more work but I want it to be as easy and stress free as possible for my visitors.

I've had my blog on blogger since early 2006 and haven't had any issues with spam. I have it set so that I moderate all comments and blogger has been very good at picking out the spam. I think blogger is really simple to use, easy to customize, and is the most popular platform for blogs. Although I've moved my blog to my store, I really like the format that blogger uses and people are familiar with it. I don't like the captcha thing either, but I see it as an evil necessity. Its always one bad apple that spoils everything...

The whole concept of blogging for a living just fascinates me. I can't believe people do it. Where do you find the time? Also the commitment to your self. A lot of money can be made out there in cyberspace. Just have to want it bad enough I guess.